China is attempting to increase its naval warship capabilities by restarting its mass production of guided-missile destroyers, according to multiple reports.
The Chinese Communist Party-controlled newspaper the Global Times reported on Tuesday that China would complete its military expansion and modernization by 2035, “including the development of a blue-water navy, to match the country’s international status and better defend its interests,” while Naval News reported that five 052D destroyers, which are capable for launching long-range missiles, are currently being built.
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John Blaxland, professor of international security and intelligence studies at the Australian National University’s strategic and defense studies center, said China’s military expansion was “deeply worrying,” according to the Guardian.
“They are designed to assert China’s influence to match its economic growth, not just in the South China Sea, not just in the first island chain [which includes Taiwan], but also more expansively through the Indo-Pacific and the Pacific Ocean,” he added. “It’s growing the navy to bolster its economic heft with military muscle.”
The Chinese navy is already the largest numerically in terms of its overall battle force of 355 ships and submarines, according to the Department of Defense’s 2021 China Military Power Report from November. Roughly 145 of them are major surface combatants.
The tension between China and the United States increased this summer as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) traveled to Taiwan in defiance of China’s public opposition. The Biden administration maintained that Pelosi’s trip was no different from the other lawmakers who have gone to Taiwan and that her arrival did not change U.S. policy, though China disagreed.
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China retaliated by escalating its military operations around Taiwan, the island off the coast of mainland China that maintains its independence despite claims from the Chinese Communist Party. Many of those military exercises were naval and consisted of encroachments in the Taiwan Strait.
